Stained Glass
by Tiny Teddy Bear
Summary: Light slips through stained glass, dappling the walls and floor and altar with soft colours. And he wonders how she can be a prisoner in the darkness, yet shine so brightly. Draco/Luna. Complete.
1. Chapter 1

_Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to Harry Potter._

* * *

She's nestling against the dark cellar wall when he goes down, and he has the odd, unbidden, fleeting fancy that she emanates light. He sees that it's that odd little blonde Ravenclaw girl from Hogwarts, and has to keep a firm hold on himself so that he doesn't panic.

'So – so you're visiting for Christmas, Loony Lovegood?' he sneers, to calm himself down. It was meant to be a taunt, but – he thinks, despising himself – it comes out with a little, pathetic quiver on the end. A coward – that's what Bellatrix called him, and she's right.

Luna Lovegood looks at him, with big grey eyes, but says nothing. She's curled up into herself, her arms clamping her knees to her chest. But she's still holding her head up, tilted gently, gracefully on her white neck, and watching him with clear unblinking grey eyes.

And all at once a wave of red helpless fury washes over him – coward's fury – and his wand is out, and pointing at her chest.

'Well – say something! _Stop looking at me!_' He's screaming at her, advancing, and, impossibly, her eyes grow even larger, and she leans back still further into the wall.

'Scared – scared of me, now?' he pants, jabbing his wand at her throat. 'I could – _kill _you now, little – staring idiot!'

'It's all right, Draco Malfoy. I don't really think you would hurt me.'

Her voice is soft and dreamy, and for a moment he has the odd fancy that he only imagined her speaking. She's _still_ looking at him. And he looks into her eyes, and everything seems to slip and tilt sickly. He's a coward – coward.

And he makes a little choking sound that's almost like a sob, and brings his wand away from her throat. His hand is shaking badly, and he takes two paces backwards, still pointing it at her.

She rises to her feet, quite slowly, and faces him, and her face has that look of ethereal calm again. The dreamy eyes drift up to a corner above Draco's head, and she suddenly smiles, a soft smile that is aeons away from the murky cellar.

She smiles like light.

And he panics, backing away. 'Goodbye, Draco Malfoy,' he hears her say softly behind him, and he throws the door shut and locks it with his hand cold and trembling on his wand.

* * *

His mind is a litany of confusion, a back-and-forth response between panic and anger, passion and despair.

He locks himself into his bedroom and catches blindly at the book that lies open on his bed, crumpling savagely at the pages with his hands. And he presses his face into the desecrated paper shreds, choking on the hot lump that's wedged in his throat.

He lies there a long time, unmoving, as the lump melts into a kind of dull misery that trickles through his bones. He wishes that he wasn't a coward, and he wishes that it didn't bother him that his family was keeping prisoners in their cellar, and mostly wishes that he was dead. But he's afraid of being dead, too, and he wishes that he wasn't afraid of so many things, that he was as brave as crazy Luna Lovegood, who's probably trying to work out how to escape right now.

* * *

No-one notices what Draco does, much, these days. Not even his mother, who spends most of her time shut away in her private chambers, away from her mad sister and all the others. He's doesn't know what she does in there, but once he was sure he heard a muffled keening. It was cut off quickly, as though she had quickly cast a silencing charm, but he knew he had heard it.

He sees her slipping off to the old manor chapel, too, always alone. Every morning, before dawn has even touched the sky, she goes, her footsteps soft past his bedroom door. Once, when he'd spent a night like a black, sleepless tunnel of despair, he almost slipped out to go with her, because he was so lonely. But with his hand on the door handle, he remembered, sickly, that yesterday he'd used his wand to torture a man he hardly knew. He never opened the door.

Now, the day after he sees Luna Lovegood in the cellar, a strangeness seizes him, an odd mixture of longing and what would, in happier days, have been curiosity. He slips out of his room in the cold dawning light, and into the chapel, after his mother has left.

He's not been there much, before, though the chapel is an old part of the Manor's history, created when it was first built. It's small, and cool, and the walls and air seem to tingle with magic, somehow: primordial, intrinsic, strangely purifying. Faint beams of rainbow light glance through the stained glass, touching here and there on the walls and floor and altar.

Generations of Malfoys have been christened in the little, white stone room, christened, and later married, and _then_, Draco thinks cynically, leaving the chapel well alone until they lie there in cold, stately death. Wizarding portraits of all of his ancestors hang on the walls, censuring and sneering at everything, and he wouldn't have placed any of them as religious. But still, they would have been horrified at the thought of being christened or married anywhere but the Malfoy Manor chapel.

It strikes him, at that moment, as grimly funny, because the Dark Lord was about as far as you could get from _love_ and _peace_ and _compassion_ and all that other religious crap, and _he_ was killing and torturing people in the same house as this quiet, pure, un-Malfoy-like chapel.

He almost laughs, rather hysterically. But there's a little white dove in the stained-glass panel above the altar, and it catches his eye, and the desire to laugh leaves him abruptly. It isn't really very funny at all.

There's a single candle burning in a holder, slim and white, its wick burning clearly. It flickers softly as a draught hits it, and he wonders why his mother hadn't warded it with her wand. He almost – _almost_ – casts a shielding spell around it himself, but catches back his hand before he's finished drawing his wand.

* * *

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	2. Chapter 2

_Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to Harry Potter._

* * *

For a few days, Draco just tries not to think about the fact that there's a girl just a year younger than he is, a girl he went to school with, being kept a prisoner in the cellar of his house. No-one goes down there much – after all, she's just a hostage, and as for the old man – well, the Dark Lord has got what he can out of him.

It's only when he's eating, alone, in his room one evening – delicious tender lamb with rosemary and mint – that a terrible thought jumps into his mind.

_Are they feeding the prisoners?_

He goes into an undignified panic, jumping up and nearly tripping over his own long legs. A corner of his mind – the scrap of logic that he still has left – says that of course they're feeding them, what use would they be if they starved, but still, but _still…_

He rushes out of his room, through the long high-walled corridors towards the cellar steps. Horrible pictures float in front of his eyes, pictures of Luna Lovegood crumpled on the floor with arms thin as sticks, legs too weak to hold her up, her cheeks hollow instead of rounded like an apple.

His unlocking spell has far too much power in it and he clangs the door shut behind him. 'Lumos,' he pants, and the light from his wand floods the cellar.

And she's there – not starved! – though rather thinner and paler than before, her huge eyes blinking painfully in the sudden brightness. The old man is lying listlessly in the back corner, facing the wall, and he doesn't even twitch, but Draco can see him breathing.

'Draco Malfoy,' Luna says softly, watching him.

'You're all right,' he says. 'They've given you food.' He feels weak and boneless with relief suddenly, like he could melt right on to the floor.

She's looking up at him, a questioning sort of look. 'The elves bring us food,' she says. 'Is that why you came to see us?'

'I – I thought,' he says, and stops, grasping for his trademark cool assurance. He tries to sneer at her, but it's hard to sneer at someone who's looking at you with the biggest, softest eyes you've ever seen. The sneer slips and melts, sliding off his face.

She's silent for a minute, and then she says, soft as a butterfly's wing, 'Did you wonder if they weren't feeding us, Draco?' And oddly, she looks away from him, past him, as she speaks, the way someone would try not to alarm some wild, frightened thing by making eye contact.

'Well, turns out they are, aren't they?' he says, roughly, but his voice goes up a little at the end. His hand is clenching and unclenching reflexively by his side.

She looks at him, then, and smiles slowly, softly. 'Your house-elves make wonderful food. Even when it's for prisoners.'

Weirdly, he's finding it hard to stop looking at her, her long tangled fair hair framing her softly curving, dirty face, her eyes great dreaming pools of reflected light. He's not sure where the words come from, but he suddenly mumbles, 'Do you need anything else?'

Her face lights up and her smile brightens. 'Well, I would like some soap,' she says. 'Do you think that maybe you could bring us some?'

'Soap,' he says awkwardly. 'All right.'

'Thank you so much,' she says, and points to some buckets of water. 'The elves who bring the food are so kind, they bring us water, but they don't have any soap. They clean everything by magic,' she adds meditatively, 'and they're forbidden to do magic in here, or they might help clean us up.'

He suddenly shivers, realising how cold it is in the cellar. Luna's dressed in a long, flowing, multi-hued tartan skirt and knitted jumper, but her skin looks pale and bluish.

'Are you – cold?' he asks, tentatively, and reaches out without thinking and touches her little curled hand. It's like ice, but he pulls his hand back like it's been burnt when he realises that he's reached out to her. 'You are cold,' he says, and, looking around, 'what do you sleep on?'

'There's some sacks there,' she says, waving her hand vaguely, and he feels colder than ever, ashamed, so that he can't look at her. He points his wand at a sack, concentrates, and transfigures it to a thick green blanket; there's a mocking voice in his head that asks why he's bothering, but somehow the delighted beam on Luna's face drowns it out.

'_Thank_ you,' she says, and he glances at her sideways and transfigures another sack. This time, the blanket comes out in the same bright pink and blue and yellow tartan plaid as her skirt, which wasn't something he consciously intended to do, and she _giggles_ softly. She shouldn't be giggling, not when she's a prisoner in a cellar, and he frowns sternly as he transfigures the next sack into a mattress and levitates it out of sight around one of the cellar partitions.

When he's done, he turns back to her, and finds that she's looking at him, with a smile not on her face but in her eyes.

'You're kind, Draco Malfoy,' she says softly, and she sounds – wondering? He looks away quickly.

'No, I'm not kind,' he says tonelessly, turning to go. 'You don't know me.' At the door he remembers something, and turns round.

'I'll bring you some soap.' He can't conjure something like soap out of thin air.

As he locks the door, it suddenly occurs to him that she could have tried to overpower him, take his wand, while he was distracted. But somehow he doesn't think she would have done that. He slips to the closest bathroom and finds the soap – great luxurious, purplish cakes of it, scented like violet. He thinks that Luna will like the smell.

She does, too, back in the cellar, taking the cakes of soap in her hands like a precious gift and breathing in deeply. 'Soap!' she says delightedly. She kneels down on the floor as he watches and washes her hands with one of the bars, using the water sparingly, and then looks up at him with a blinding smile.

'It's lovely,' she says simply. He gives her an awkward almost-smile back, before he realises what he's doing and looks away.

'It's alright,' he says.

As he leaves, she says, 'Good night, Draco,' and her voice is soft and sort of soothing, like a dove in the twilight, and he _almost_ says goodnight to her as well, glancing back uncertainly. She's watching him go with her head tipped to one side and a soft look on her face.


	3. Chapter 3

_Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to Harry Potter._

* * *

That night, he falls asleep with the picture of her face in his mind, and dreams, oddly enough, not of death and fear, but of sitting on the grass with doves all around him.

In the dream, he has a piece of bread in his hand, and he's breaking off tiny crumbs and putting them on his outstretched palm, and offering them to one of the doves. Softly cooing, it stretches over his hand to reach the crumbs, and his fingertips brush the warm, living, feathered softness of its breast.

'It's lovely.'

Dream-Draco turns towards the soft voice. It's Luna, sitting next to him, her hands flowing over with dew-damp violets, her head tipped to one side. She looks serious, as though it's important that he realise just how lovely it is.

'Here,' she says, holding the violets out, 'take them. They're for you, but don't keep them in your cellar, because it's too dark.'

The doves are pressing around the dream-Luna as she speaks, nestling their soft grey-white bodies against her, and she smiles down at them delightedly, still offering him the sweet damp handfuls of flowers.

'I can't take them!' Draco tells her, agitated. 'I can't, I really can't. Don't you see? I don't have anywhere else for them to go.' He's panicking, in the dream, holding out his hands as though to keep her away, tensing up his body to get up and run away.

'Don't worry,' she says, comfortingly, 'it's OK. _He_ can help you; He likes to look after people.' She points behind him, placing the violets in her lap, and Draco twists round to see, but all he can see is sunshine and grass and trees.

'You can't see Him, can you?' she says. 'It's allright, I didn't think you'd be able to, at first.' She puts her hand on his arm and strokes down it gently, warm and shivery.

'I can see _you_,' Draco says, rather defensively. 'You're beautiful.'

'Well,' she says, 'that's something,' and the soft look is back on her face as she raises her eyes to meet his. Then everything dissolves and it's early morning, and the sky outside his window is just beginning to lighten. The dream goes fuzzy in his mind, but he can remember the doves and the damp violets, and Luna's hand on his arm.

* * *

He rolls over, and then realises: it's Christmas Day.

Unsurprisingly, there aren't any presents for him, but at least he's warm and safe – or at least _sort_ of safe. He remembers how dark it was in the cellar, dark and cold and cheerless, and something throbs in his chest. It feels strangely similar to pity, and Draco Malfoy does _not_ pity people.

But still. It was _cold_ down there. He carefully avoids wondering if Luna Lovegood is missing her home, but his bed is somehow not very comfortable anymore, so he gets up and dresses. Perhaps he ought to go and check on the prisoners today. He can't really pretend to himself that he enjoys gloating over people any more – he used to, but something shifted over the last year. But someone really _should_ be checking on them.

He slips off to his mother's chapel, after she's been there in the pre-dawn stillness, to see if he can find any candles. It feels oddly unhurried in there, he notices, restful, and the cold winter morning sunbeams slip through the stained-glass above the altar, splashing rainbow light across the room.

He looks at the stained-glass panel, really noticing it for the first time. There's the dove, and a lamb on a green hill and a golden-maned lion. Why on earth, he wonders, is there a _lion_ in stained-glass in the chapel of _Malfoy Manor_? Actually, nothing about the panel is much like what he would have expected in his family's home, and he scowls at the stupid gentle lamb. It has its head on one side like Luna as it looks down at him. Did his ancestors even look at the stained-glass before they had it put in?

He finds the candles in an ornately carved wooden box, and picks out two fat, sturdy ones to take down to the cellar. He looks back at the peaceful little room before he leaves, and sees that his mother has left another candle burning, and a tiny white rosebud. It gives him an idea, and he leaves, the stained-glass lamb watching him as he goes.

He goes out into the grounds, through the snow, to the vast, magically heated greenhouse where roses grow even at Christmastime. As he slips through the door, he hears a quiet crack of Disapparition – he's obviously surprised one of the garden-elves at their work. There are roses everywhere, on bushes and creepers, deep red and soft pink and, his mother's favourite, pure white.

It's hard to choose, but he finally settles on a pale yellow rose that smells like sweet sunshine and the aliveness of growing things, and nips off three blooms and a bud. He carefully uses his wand to remove the thorns.

* * *

When he opens the cellar door, she's sitting, facing it, with her legs crossed, and she looks up into his face with a bright smile as he casts the wand-lighting charm. She's cocooned in the bright tartan blanket, and he sees the tips of her little white fingers curled around the edge. He looks around for Mr Ollivander, but the old man is curled up, facing the wall, in exactly the same position as last time. There's a blanket tucked in around him too, though.

'I thought it was you,' Luna says. 'You walk differently to the others.'

Draco looks at her, then down at the flowers in his hands, suddenly feeling like an idiot. 'I, um, brought these,' he says, and stops awkwardly.

'Flowers!' she says softly, wonderingly. 'You brought them down here for – me?'

'Uh – yeah,' he says, and then, quieter, because he's not entirely sure he wants her hearing him at all, 'it's Christmas.'

He offers her the roses, and she reaches out both hands, small and with splayed fingers like a child, to take them. Her eyes are as wide and unblinking as ever, but then he sees something wet and silvery start to trickle down her cheek, and she swallows softly.

'Don't cry!' he says, panicking. He can _sort_ of handle his mother crying – she cried a lot, last year, and he was the only one there to comfort her – but Luna Lovegood?

'Look, please, I didn't mean…' He trails off, and does the only thing that he can think of; crouches down next to her, reaches forward, and softly brushes the tear away with his knuckle.

He watches her face worriedly. 'Lovegood… Luna?' he says, tentative. She's sort of smiling now, a little bit wobbly, but definitely on safer ground.

'Sorry,' she says. 'Thank you, Draco. Merry Christmas.'

They look at each other, warder and prisoner, and Draco feels the uncertain little tug of a smile at the corner of his mouth. She smiles back, softly, and a little thread of understanding reaches out between the two of them and connects.

He looks away after a moment, embarrassed, and digs into his pocket to pull out the candles. 'Here,' he says, 'candles. I'll light them before I go, but you must blow them out if you hear anyone coming.'

She reaches out and puts her hand gratefully on his knee. He jumps, because he can't remember the last time that someone touched him gently, voluntarily, someone who wasn't his mother. Though it shames him, he goes still, drinking in the touch of her hand. He hopes she won't take it away, and she doesn't.

She looks cleaner now, around her face, but her skirt and jumper are filthy, streaked with dust and dirt she must have picked up from the walls and floor. Of course, she has nothing to change into, and she can't take them off and wash them, not with it so cold, and with Ollivander in the cellar.

'Your clothes,' he says self-consciously. 'Do you want me to –?'

'Oh, can you clean them up?' she asks, bright and totally _un_-self-conscious.

'Yeah,' he mumbles, 'yeah, I know a spell…'

She gives his knee a gentle pat before she pushes off the blanket and stands up. Then she spreads her arms, facing him, making her body open and vulnerable; it's almost as though she trusts him. 'Please?' she says.

'You shouldn't do that,' he tells her sternly. 'I might be about to – hex you.'

She tilts her head slightly, sceptically, and smiles at him. He's starting to wonder about the odd fizz he gets in his chest when she does that. Maybe it's his conscience again. Anyway. He lifts his wand and waves it slightly at her clothes.

'_Laundrium Enstarchio!_' It's a good spell; he knows that, he's used it enough times at school to keep up his image of well-groomed elegance. Something tiny and warm and pleased blossoms inside him as he sees her pleasure at having her clothes fresh and clean again. It's sort of – cute, really.

Damn it. He must be mad to be thinking things like that, as though everything's normal and peaceful and his family's not keeping a couple of prisoners locked up in the cellar of their house. He shakes himself, mentally, to remember how serious life actually is, and turns to go.

'Goodbye, Draco,' he hears her say as he leaves, and then, softly, 'Merry Christmas.'

He doesn't answer, but afterwards spends rather too long wondering whether he should have.


	4. Chapter 4

_Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to Harry Potter._

* * *

He goes back down to the cellar again that evening – merely, of course, to check on the prisoners. His father is ranting about something, and Bellatrix is shrieking at him, and Rodolphus is in the background swearing foully under his breath, and his mother is locked in her room again, probably sobbing behind a silencing charm. And – well – it's _Christmas_, and who can blame him for just wanting someone to smile at him?

Her face lights up when she sees him – he _knows _he didn't imagine it, and there's a little warm spot in his chest. He gives her a small uncertain twist of a smile, and she seems to know what he wants, and smiles back, open and peaceful. She's still holding the roses in her hands.

'Er, hello,' he says lamely.

'Hello, Draco,' she says. 'Are you having a nice Christmas?'

The look on his face seems to give her the answer, because she says, 'Oh, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked. It's nice of you to come and see us here again.'

He carefully looks away from her, and snorts, _almost_ contemptuously, because, after all, he's not a nice person, and he doesn't want her under any false illusions. The trouble is, she doesn't seem to quite get it, because she reaches out and slips her hand in his, squeezing it. His fingers jump slightly in hers. It feels odd, but sort of – nice, as well.

'Sit down?' she says softly, and he does, reminding himself that he's only here because he doesn't have anything better to be doing. They sit on one of the mattresses he transfigured, and it's cold, so he casts a warming charm around them. Luna gives a little shiver of ecstasy, closing her eyes and moving her limbs about slightly in the warmth, as a cat might. Then she seems to think of something.

'Mr Ollivander!' she says. 'He's so cold, even with your blankets. Maybe you could cast a warming spell on him?'

Draco twists around, looking for the old wandmaker, but he can't see him. 'Over here, Draco,' she says. Ollivander's huddled on the other mattress, seemingly asleep, and Luna beams as he casts warmth over the old man.

'Is he – all right?' Draco asks, sitting down again and wondering why he should care.

A little vertical crease appears between her eyebrows, and he absentmindedly imagines smoothing it out with two fingertips, before he catches himself, horrified.

'He barely moves or talks,' she's saying, 'and hardly eats anything unless I persuade him to.'

They're both silent for a while, and Luna closes her eyes and tips her head back slightly, basking in the warmth. Her throat is soft and white, he notices, and the long fair curling mass of her hair is hanging free around her, dropping over her shoulders.

His mouth is suddenly dry. His eyes slide to her lips, soft and tender and relaxed, and he wants suddenly, fiercely, to _kiss_ her, more than anything else. But her eyes are closed, and it wouldn't be quite fair to give her no warning.

'Luna,' he croaks.

Her eyes open, big and grey and startled at the roughness of his voice. Then his hands find her shoulders through her hair, and he pulls them closer together, and her eyes soften impossibly as she tilts her face gently up to his.

Their lips touch softly, clumsily, once, twice, and his head is exploding, sending off fireworks and celebrations and danger signals. They fall apart. Luna's chest is rising and falling softly, and she brings up questioning fingers and touches her lips. He grabs his head in frantic hands.

'Damn,' he says. 'Damn. Damn.' He wants to say stronger things too, but he doesn't, because Luna's there, watching him in a waiting sort of way. Then he glances up at her, and she's looking a little uncertain, and it drives everything else out of his head on a great wave of something akin to tenderness.

He reaches out, jerkily, and puts his arms around her, tugging her close so that she's nestling against him. His hands lock demandingly about her. She rests her palm and her cheek on his chest, and he rocks her, because, truth be told, he's out of his depth and running on instinct. If he thinks about it too hard, he could panic.

He feels her shift a little, and looks down, and, of all things, she seems to be _laughing_; soft, wholesome, tender, _normal_ laughter. She looks up at him with her head still on his chest.

'Maybe there's mistletoe a few rooms above. At least down here the Nargles can't get at us,' she says, and he gives a surprised, shaky crack of amusement. She's _sweet_, he thinks hazily, making a new discovery, sweet; and he tightens his arms around her, tentatively, and kisses her on the forehead. Her eyes close and she makes a little, contented sound in her throat, like a kitten.

'What are Nargles?' he asks softly.

'They're little creatures that infest mistletoe, but you can't see them,' she says seriously, and she doesn't seem to mind when he laughs again.

It's comforting, sitting there with Luna in his arms, and not needing to talk, or sneer, or pretend about anything. He just sits, for a long time, and listens to her breathing, slow and soft and calm, and now and then she pats him with small gentle hands.

It's very hard to leave the cellar that time; he feels like a moth at a candle flame. But Luna is better than a candle, because her light can't be puffed out by a draught, or even by being kept in a dark cold prison. And then, of course, she doesn't incinerate him, which is nice.

He peels himself away finally, touching her face gently in farewell. This time, she doesn't say anything, just smiles at him softly as he goes, and it feels all wrong, so wrong, to be locking her in behind him.

* * *

Later, of course, when he's back upstairs into hard reality, the euphoria of her lips wears away. He feels guilty and miserable and conscience-stricken, and spends a horrible white night tossing and turning, wondering what sort of perverted person went and kissed a girl he barely knew, a girl who was being held prisoner in his cellar.

Put that way, it sounds twisted and dark and impure. It's _not_, he tells himself furiously, and slams his fist into his pillow.

He's been so lonely. He lost control for a few seconds, that was all, because – because she treated him like a person again, like he was an ordinary guy who wasn't evil. Who can blame him for just wanting some comfort, just to feel like a human again?

And she was so bright, so pure and candle-bright that kissing her felt like being warmed by a flame…

There's a part of him, inside, that's sneering. _Luna Lovegood?_ it snickers. _Seriously? The little oddball with no friends, who wanders around talking about imaginary creatures? And you know quite well it was more than 'a few seconds'. How long did you sit there holding her, like a child with a safety blanket? Are you desperate or something, Malfoy?_

_Shut up,_ the other part of him says wrathfully, the part that he's only recently discovered he has, that shames him. The part that worries and feels guilty and – cares – about things sometimes._ She's… sweet._

_Sickening, _says the nasty one derisively. _What's wrong with you? All that nauseating 'love' and 'goodness' getting to you?_

_She _is_ good,_ he returns, defensively.

_There's no good or bad, you fool. Only power and strength. And Lovegood's as weak and soft as a kitten. She wouldn't last two minutes with dear Aunt Bellatrix or the Dark Lord._

A clamminess breaks out on his forehead and neck, and fear catches him in the throat.

_See?_ the voice mocks. _No good getting too attached to your little prisoner. You'll just get hurt._

_I don't damn well care,_ says the other voice, in a foolhardy, defiant sort of way._ I won't let… _He cringes at how Gryffindor it sounds, and at the contemptuous snickering of the mocking voice.

_What can you do? You're a coward, not a red-and-gold Gryffindor._

Yes, he's a coward, and probably wouldn't be able to protect her if she needed it, he thinks dully. But there's one little thing, one little shining strand of – something, that he grasps and hold on to.

_She _is _good,_ he thinks stubbornly._ She has to be. She is!_

The other voice just laughs again, and now it sounds like the Dark Lord, high and cold. _Good, _it mocks. _Good. Good like the little chapel lamb, waiting patiently to be killed… and eaten…_ There's that laugh again, and he flings his arm across his face to try and block it out.

He sleeps at last, near morning, and his dreams are black and white and shadowy grey, and he can't remember them when he wakes.


	5. Chapter 5

_Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to Harry Potter._

* * *

He stays away from the cellar and Luna for the whole morning, the next day, before he cracks and goes down there again. And she looks so happy and sweet when she sees him, with such big soft eyes, that he forgets everything and reaches out his hands to her.

She takes them, and then he's bringing his lips down to meet hers, and it's so innocent, so gentle, that he feels an odd, wistful tightness at the back of his throat. He slides his arms around her, down her back to her waist.

She's soft, and little, and warm from the charm he cast in the cellar the night before. She makes a little satisfied sound as he kisses her, and it gives him a strange sharp shiver through his body.

And then, abruptly, everything lurches, tilts, changes; and there's a haze tingling at the edge of his vision.

Everything is suddenly too tight and hot, and his breath is coming shortly, and his hands are seeking at her white neck, his fingers beating against the silky skin of her collarbone. He can't think straight, and a searing fierceness is pulsing through his body. _I need… please! I must… I want…_

She goes very quiet. Then, her hands come up to cover his, softly, stilling them as they tug at her neckline.

'No,' she says gently.

'Luna…' It comes out jerkily, between hard fast breaths. But she takes his hands in her soft ones and moves them away from her neck, and twists herself around so that her back is against his chest. She twines her fingers in his, holding them in a safe, neutral sort of position over her stomach.

His mind is still fuzzed and pulsing, and she seems to understand, because she says nothing for a few minutes. He can feel his heart thudding hard against her at first, but slowly it quietens.

When she speaks, her voice is soft. 'No,' she says again. 'I don't think that would be a very good idea.'

'Why not?' he rasps.

'We aren't married, for one thing, Draco.' She tilts her head to gaze dreamily at the cellar ceiling.

He stiffens. But – it somehow seems _right _for pure little Luna to feel that way. She rubs the back of her head against his shoulder softly, comforting.

He can't help it. He says – and it comes out horrifyingly like a whine – 'Who – who could give a _damn_ whether we're marriedor not?'

She doesn't say anything right away, and when she speaks, it's softer than ever, and her eyes are full of light. 'Some things are too special to give away so easily, I think.'

Shame washes over him, so that he wants to lash out at something. He says a foul word, spitting it past her ear.

'That sounds very ugly, Draco,' she murmurs. He thinks that no-one should say that kind of word around Luna Lovegood, and wonders suddenly, randomly, what awful kinds of things the other Death Eaters have said to her.

'Oh, _Luna_,' he says, and bows his head down heavily, till his chin rests on her shoulder. She tilts her head to nestle against his face, and she smells like the soap he brought to her before, mixed with the damp earthiness of the cellar.

'And I'm a prisoner here, too,' she says quietly.

Yes. She's a prisoner. And it would be wrong, so wrong, quite apart from any other reason, just for the fact that she _is_ a prisoner.

He feels suddenly worthless, unclean, and peels himself away from her, scooting about a foot away. A sick sort of self-hatred seethes in the core of his stomach. He might have _raped_ her. He's always been a bully, after all.

'I'll go,' he says, quick and hard.

But as he's starting to get to his feet, looking anywhere but her, she reaches out her hand. 'Wait,' she says dreamily, 'come here?'

He doesn't come, but stops half-way between sitting and standing, balancing on one knee. She crawls over to him slowly, and reaches up, and sinks her fingers into his hair. He freezes, his eyelids squeezing shut at her touch, as her hands caress through his hair, moving over his head in soft circles.

It's awkward and wonderful and soothing, and something about the feel of her fingers manages to dissolve the twist of hatred in his stomach. And then she slips her arms around his neck for a fleeting hug that's more motherly than anything.

She slips out of his reach before he can put his arms around her, facing him and smiling softly. 'Maybe you should go now, Draco,' she murmurs, and he looks into her eyes, and tries to say that he's sorry, for everything. But it sticks in the back of his throat, because he's never said sorry to anyone before, not really.

Her eyes smile at him, though, and give him a sort of strength, as though she's transferring an echo of her courage to him. All the same, he knows he's still a coward inside, and he wishes he wasn't, because then he would be able to tell her how sorry he was.

His hands feel oddly heavy, tired, as he locks the cellar door behind him.

* * *

Strangely enough, he sleeps well and deep that night, and wakes at dawn to hear his mother's soft steps, returning, he thinks, from the chapel. She's the only one about at this time – he thinks the Dark Lord and his followers seem to work more at evening and night; he never sees them in the freshness of early morning. On a whim, he slips from his room, up the long corridor, and raps softly on the door to his mother's chambers.

There's no answer, and he can sense her frozen, waiting apprehension.

'Mother?' he whispers.

The door opens a little way, and he steps through, hesitating, not sure what to say. She's sitting in a carved Queen Anne chair by the window, and she makes a slight motion of her wand towards the door, shutting it silently behind him. He stands just inside, looking at her uncertainly.

'Draco,' she says, and searches his face for a tiny second before opening her arms to him. And oh, she's his _mother_, and he kneels next to her chair and puts his arms around her, and she puts hers around him and draws him tightly to her. He presses his face into her shoulder, breathing in her faint mother-smell, and feels like he's five years old again, but it's somehow okay.

She strokes his back, and when he draws a little away from her, her eyes are damp as she looks down at him.

'Mother,' he says again, then stops, because he has no idea of what to say. The dawn is tinted in tender rose and gold and eggshell blue outside the glass panes, and he has the sudden thought that if Luna were here, she would say softly how beautiful it was and probably find some strange simile for the sun that glimpsed over the horizon. He thought it would make them laugh, which would be a good thing, and might make the burning in his throat go away.

But neither he nor his mother are like that, so they look at each other, wondering what to say, what they dare to say. He concentrates on not letting his breathing quiver.

He glances at the table beside her and sees that there's a book on it, large and leather-bound, and thinks she must have just closed it when he whispered at her door. When he looks back to his mother's face, there's something odd in her delicate features. Fear. She's afraid… but there's something else, too, something he can't put a name to.

'Oh, Draco…' she whispers suddenly, almost as though she didn't want to speak at all. 'Oh, my dearest… I don't know what to think… I'm afraid…'

'Mother,' he says quickly, and then, realising that it's the third time he's said it, makes himself go on. 'What – is it? Tell me!'

She reaches out and touches the book softly, running her fingers along the spine. 'What if – we've all been wrong?'

Draco's not sure why, but something about her voice alarms him. 'Be quiet,' he says, and can hear the rough edge of panic in his own low voice. '_Please_, Mother. What are you talking about?' His hand is clenching and unclenching around the dainty arm of her chair, but he only realises it when his mother covers it with both her own. 'What is it?' he says again.

Her elegant fingers are stroking around his wrist soothingly, but then her hands, and everything about her, go still. She raises her head slowly to look at him, and there's a sudden indefinable dignity about her.

'Look,' she says, and motions, gracefully, with her head, towards the book.

He flips it over. _Holy Bible_. He looks at her, completely nonplussed. It feels like an anticlimax.

'It's just the Bible,' he says. Surely she doesn't think that there's anything in there that could make a difference to the Dark Lord. Not really.

'Have you – ever read it, Draco?' she asks wistfully.

He shifts a little, uncomfortably. He was brought up, of course, knowing that reading the Bible was a proper, well-bred thing to do. Not that anyone in the family actually ever caught anyone else reading it. He'd also picked up, quite early on, that it _wasn't_ well-bred to draw comparisons between what the Bible said and how the Malfoys actually lived their lives.

He owns a Bible, of course – a huge, expensive tome that had been bestowed upon him at his christening – but it lives in a nice silver box somewhere and he can't quite recall actually _reading_ it much.

'Um,' he says, 'I've read bits of it, yeah.'

He does know a bit about it. It's divided into two sections that are for some reason called 'Testaments'. It starts off with God creating the world. About half-way through, Jesus comes down out of heaven and heals lots of sick people, then dies by crucifixion, as a kind of payment for everything bad everyone else has done.

His mother clasps her hands together in her lap and looks down at them, the new sun glancing off the fairness of her hair. She says nothing for a moment, and when she speaks she sounds, again, almost as though she doesn't want to.

'It's all about – love,' she murmurs, the last word stumbling on her tongue as though she's unused to using it. 'Always. Nothing else can – stand against it.'

He wonders suddenly, awfully, if perpetual fear has driven her insane. She seems to realise what he's thinking from his look, because she draws herself erect and says in quite a different voice, cool and self-possessed, 'I'm not mad, Draco.'

With tacit understanding, they break off and talk about other things, whatever shallow superficial topics they can muster, for a few minutes. But before he leaves, she places her cool hand on his cheek and looks swiftly, searchingly, into his eyes, and he gets the distinct impression that they've left a lot unsaid.


	6. Chapter 6

_Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter._

* * *

Draco doesn't fight the urge to go down to the cellar again, not much, and Luna gives him her bright dreamy smile when he opens the door. He doesn't quite trust himself to kiss her, but they sit close together and she tells him softly about all the things she's fascinated by, how she would like to go on a world tour when she's older, and explore and discover for herself. He manages to keep his breathing fairly steady, even when she squeezes his hand in her enthusiasm.

'The sunrise was amazing this morning,' he says to her, out of the blue. 'I thought you would have liked it.'

Her face goes pointed with longing for a fleeting instant. He'd sort of forgotten that there was no way she could have seen it, down here, and sudden sick shame curls inside him. He inches a little away from her and shoves his hands in his pockets, turning his face away.

'I'll take you,' he offers, after a moment. 'Around the world. Anywhere. We can look for all those things together.'

Her face goes soft, and she smiles at him. 'That would be lovely,' she says dreamily, and then, 'We could see lots of sunrises… and the sky and sun.'

He puts his arm around her tentatively, and she leans her head down to rest, quite naturally, on his shoulder.

And he finds himself asking, 'Luna, have you – read the Bible?' He flushes as he says it, stiffening slightly, waiting for her to laugh.

She doesn't laugh, of course, but tips her head interestedly towards him, on his shoulder. 'Yes,' she says, and waits, as though she's not going to force the subject on him unless he really wants to speak about it.

He's actually not sure he _does_ want to talk about it, but he says, awkwardly, 'My mother keeps reading it, and she said – that it's all about – love.' The last word sounds as odd on his tongue as it did when his mother said it.

'It _is_ love, the whole book,' Luna says suddenly, softly. '_Everything_ is, don't you think?'

Actually it's pretty opposite to what he does think, which is that love is a rather scarce commodity these days, and he doesn't have the strength to play pretend for her.

'No,' he says harshly. 'The Dark Lord is taking everything over, you _have_ to know that! Do you think the _Dark Lord_ has anything to do with _love_? Love is _weak_.' And he turns his face away.

She's smoothing her fingers over the veins standing out on the back of his hand, which he didn't realise was clenched so tightly. 'Love isn't weak,' she says firmly, as though she's prepared to let him say all sorts of other crazy things, but not that. She goes on with her calming little strokes on his hand, and it feels good, and he closes his eyes.

'Whatever,' he says, tiredly.

'I'd rather go with no food than no love,' she comments idly, as though it's a perfectly normal thing to say. 'Because if there isn't any love, why bother eating anyway?' And she gives a little thoughtful hum in the back of her throat, agreeing with herself.

'Luna,' he says, 'seriously? You'd rather have no food?'

'Of course,' she says, like there's no question about it.

'I'll bet that you're all friendly and lovey-dovey with absolutely everyone you meet, at school.' It somehow doesn't sound as sneering as he'd intended, perhaps because of the fact that she's nestled trustfully into his side, and he still has his arm wrapped around her shoulders.

'No, actually,' she says sadly, her mouth turning down slightly at the corners. 'I would like to have lots of friends, but not many people are interested in being friends with me.'

He thinks that those other people must find her too bizarre and unusual, and feels an odd surge of protectiveness, which he tries not to acknowledge. 'Their loss, I guess,' he says awkwardly.

'Are you friends with me, Draco?' she says wistfully.

It throws him off balance. 'Of course I am!' he blurts, then, stumbling a bit, 'I mean – that is… if you want…' But she's glowing, smiling at him again so that it's like sunshine warming him up from his head to his toes, like stained-glass light pooling around him.

'Thank you,' she says softly, as though he's given her something precious and wonderful.

* * *

He goes and spends most of every day with her, after that, and no-one else even notices, or checks, or cares. But he knows he'll have to go back to school at the end of the Christmas holidays, and it lies like a weight on his chest. There'll be no-one there for Luna, no-one to talk to her and cast warming charms over her and the silent, listless Ollivander every day.

He makes sure she has enough candles, and matches so that she can light them herself. He finds more blankets, and when she asks, he even brings her paper and pencils, so that she can draw by the candlelight. But still – still – he's afraid, sick afraid. He's a _coward_, and there's nothing he can do to protect her, nothing.

The night before he leaves, he goes to see her, standing, wretched, just inside the door. 'I'm going back to Hogwarts,' he says drearily. 'Tomorrow – first thing.'

'Oh, Draco,' she says softly, as though he's the one who's worse off and needs sympathy. 'I'm so sorry to hear that.' And she comes over to him and puts her hands on his arms.

He knows that really, it's all wrong that _she_ should be feeling sorry for _him_, but her compassion feels like balm, and he savours it, putting his arms around her and burying his face in her soft hair. 'I'll _miss_ you,' he says fiercely.

She says something which gets muffled into his chest, but he thinks that she'll miss him too, and grips her, suddenly, even tighter. 'Luna, _Luna_!'

They cling together, and don't speak for a long time, just hold each other and breathe.


	7. Chapter 7

_Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter._

* * *

It's worse than ever, at Hogwarts, grey and lifeless. Draco doesn't have to do the Cruciatus on the other students, when they have detention, but he hears the screams and knows that it's _his_ fault, really. The Carrows sneer at him for not wanting to join in the torture, but don't touch him – he's an initiated Death Eater, after all. The other students despise him, but fear him even more, and he supposes, dully, that it's fair enough.

Luna wasn't afraid of him, and he_ wants_ her, wants her so that it's like an ache in his chest. No-one else will even talk to him freely – even the other Slytherin students are carefully wary of what they say around him.

But most of all, there's a constant cold sick fear inside him, fear of what might be happening to Luna in the cellar of his house. It's so bad that he actually throws up sometimes, emptying his stomach till he's gasping for breath and his face, in the bathroom mirror, is the grey-white of old laundry. Then he slumps on the floor of the prefects' bathroom, spent, not caring much that he's missing lessons.

The teachers' suspicion and fear is almost harder to bear than the students'. McGonagall goes through her lessons stiffly, her face cold, looking past him and through him, never at him. Slughorn fumbles nervously when Draco's near him, assuming a painful joviality that's worse than McGonagall's iciness. Flitwick is kind to all the students, even the Slytherins. He tries to make them feel better by conjuring things like cupcakes and bracelets and small white mice out of the air. But when he looks at Draco, his eyes are angry. Luna was one of his favourite students.

Draco catches one of the white mice, though, while everyone else is still laughing and exclaiming, closing his hand around it before it can scuttle away and probably be eaten by Mrs Norris. He holds it under the desk, feeling its little palpitating heart under his fingers, trying to calm it down by running a finger gently along its back. No-one's even noticed – he sits at the back, rather away from the others.

Finally the mouse goes to sleep in his hand, its little scrabbly paws clutching his finger. He takes it back to his bed in his deserted dormitory and sits there for a long time, gently petting the velvet of its back. It doesn't seem to be scared of him any more, the silly thing, and he lifts it up and looks at the tiny, perfect, silken ears, the pointed nose and little pink paws. For some reason it makes him think of doves and lambs and Luna.

He thinks it would be nice to have some living company, even if it's only a mouse, and he flicks his wand at a pair of socks and transfigures them into a little silver cage. But as he's about to slip the little creature in, he realises that it's another prison, and he can't do it. So instead he gives it a last, regretful stroke, bends down and puts it on the ground.

It looks around with bright eyes, sitting on its haunches and cleaning its whiskers with its front paws. 'Go on,' he says. 'You're free. Mrs Norris doesn't come into the dormitories. Go on!'

The mouse just cocks its head, looks far, far up at him, and _laughs_. Then it climbs into his trunk, curls up into a pile of handkerchiefs, and closes its eyes.

'What are you doing?!' he says. It opens one eye and looks at him limpidly. Maybe it's a magic mouse. He sits down on the edge of his bed, reaching out his hand to it.

'Come on,' he says. 'You don't _really_ want to stay with me, do you?' As though in answer, it climbs composedly onto his hand, up his sleeve and sits on his shoulder.

The mouse takes to travelling with him wherever he goes, under his robes or in his pocket. He calls it Lucille, and feeds it little scraps of cheese and bread and bacon when people aren't looking. It makes everything feel slightly, just very slightly better, that Lucille, like Luna, neither fears nor despises him.


	8. Chapter 8

_Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter._

* * *

Finally, _finally_, it's the Easter break, and he boards the Hogwarts Express with a strange lightness in his heart, despite everything. No-one wants to sit in his compartment except Crabbe and Goyle, and they don't really talk to him, spending most of their time eating. He tunes out of the munching noise of their jaws, looking out of the window and petting Lucille with one finger as she lies sleepily in his hand.

His mother meets him on the platform at the station, and he puts his arms around her as she kisses him on his cheek, an unusually public display of affection. He shows her Lucille, and, weirdly, she looks for an instant as though she might burst into tears, as the little mouse looks up at her, cleaning its whiskers. But the moment passes, and she just smiles, a little unsteadily.

And then, at last, his trunk's back in his bedroom; he's gone through the ordeal of greeting Bellatrix and her husband, both of whom are, thankfully, rather uninterested; and he's had tea with his mother, pale and silent and forlorn. Finally, he's left alone, and he goes down the steps to the cellar with dry lips and clammy hands.

At first, he can't see anyone in his bright wand-light, and his heart gives a great painful thud against his chest.

'Luna?' he says, and his voice is panicky.

'Draco.' He hears her soft voice, and then she comes out from one of the alcoves with her hands out towards him, smiling a little, her eyes big and grey and soft. Relief, warm and delicious, washes through him, making him go weak at the knees.

'You're all right,' he says unsteadily.

'Pretty much,' she agrees. He reaches out and then hugs her suddenly, fiercely. Lucille, who's in his pocket, protests with a squeak at being jolted, climbing down his leg to the floor.

'Oh!' Luna says happily. 'You have a mouse!' She twists to peer around his arm at Lucille.

'Or _she_ has _me_, you might say,' Draco grumbles half-heartedly. He's realising something, with his arms around her like this. 'Luna. You're not alright, you're too thin!'

'I'm OK,' she says vaguely. 'What's her name?'

He takes her shoulders and looks at her from a little distance. 'You're all – peaky looking – too.'

She has her dreamiest look on. 'Maybe she's a Moon-Mouse and can talk to you when the moon's full…'

'Luna,' he says sternly. 'Has something happened? Tell me.'

'She's got really long whiskers, like a Moon-Mouse…'

'_You're_ a Moon-Mouse!' he says, half laughing, half exasperated. He pushes her face up with his fingers to make her look at him. '_Honestly_, Luna... please, tell me?'

She meets his eyes, looking a little worried, and runs her tongue over her lips. 'It's all right, really, Draco. But Bellatrix came down her a few days after you'd gone, and I was – scared, a little bit.'

His stomach lurches when she says Bellatrix's name, and his fingers tighten on her shoulders. 'Did she do anything?'

'She kicked Mr Ollivander.'

'But to you?' he says urgently.

'She didn't touch me,' Luna says gently. 'She just – shrieked, sort of, and laughed at us.'

He feels sick. 'Insane,' he says helplessly. 'Insane… oh, _Luna_.'

'It's all right,' she soothes. 'It's fine, I looked at her, and she stopped kicking Mr Ollivander after that.'

'You looked at her?' he says.

'Yes,' she says. 'She didn't hurt us, and she hasn't come back, either.'

They sit down on the mattress, and she slips her hand into his, squeezing it. He tells her Lucille's name, and the little mouse sits, bright-eyed and alert, on her palm, as Luna talks to her softly. Lucille looks like she's listening, and then she does a little somersault, landing neatly on Luna's palm again and looking smug.

'Show-off,' he says.

Luna laughs, delighted. 'She's sweet! She even smirks like you do, Draco.'

* * *

He's sitting there, watching the gentle curve of her lips as she tells him about one of her strange fancies – in fact, she's wondering if his crazy aunt Bellatrix is suffering from a bad case of Hovering Slow-Flies, whatever they are.

'She just _mad_,' he says, still watching her mouth, the softness of it and the little dip in the upper lip.

'But maybe she can't help being mad, Draco,' she says earnestly, looking at him with those big grey eyes, and it's too much. He uncurls himself from the floor and swoops towards her, bringing his hands down on her shoulders.

She just kneels there in front of him, looking at him with a trace of a smile. The heat of his hands is soaking into her too-thin shoulders, and he leans down and covers her soft lips with his own. She's trembling, kissing him back, her arms slipping around him.

And the feel of her mouth quivering against his makes everything in his head go bright and needy and boldly coloured, throbbing, and he pulls her closer, closer, his hands running over her frantically…

This time, she doesn't pull away, but it's as though she's cast into stasis, trembling on the edge between holding back and melting into him. 'Luna, _Luna_,' he mumbles, his face dropping into the soft white sanctuary of her neck, and he wants her, wants her so much, and he thinks all his pain could go away if she'd just _let_ him…

'No…' she says, her voice just a smear of sound, like the tiny mew of a newborn kitten. _No_ – but she's still there, not pulling away, not pressing closer, quivering against him.

No.

_No_. It drops like a pebble into the deep waters of his consciousness, and he suddenly knows that if he's going to respect what she wants, if he's ever going to have a shred of self-respect ever again, _he _has to be the one to pull away.

_Away from her. Now!_

It's the hardest thing he's ever done, though a part of him is busy telling him that it's ridiculous that _this_ should be so hard, when he's tortured people and watched them being killed, and eaten, by a giant snake…

But it _is_ hard. It's like moving a mountain or wrestling a – a bear, or something. He peels his hands off her, and it's as though there's some sort of glue between them.

Then he sits down again, a good four feet away from her, and looks down at his hands for a while. When he looks up at her, she's smiling, and looking curiously like a child and a woman at the same time, with those wide, moonshadowy-grey eyes, and a soft flush still on her face.

'Thank you,' she says, her voice the tiniest bit unsteady. She's smiling, smiling like light again, so that it casts a glow on him, and he feels warm inside, warm in a place in his chest that's always been cold before. He thinks, suddenly, oddly, of sunshine streaming through stained glass, of multi-coloured light spattering on creamy stone.

And he knows, then, like another pebble into deep waters, that he's lost. He loves her.

He _loves_ her – and she's a prisoner in his damned cellar. It could almost make him laugh, if it wasn't so hideous and tragic.

'I'm sorry,' he says suddenly, and it comes out like water from a burst dam. 'Luna – Luna – I'm sorry.'

'I know,' she says, looking at him tenderly, and something breaks inside him.

'I love you,' he says, and he passes a desperate hand over his eyes.

'Yes,' she says gently. 'I love you too, you know.'


	9. Chapter 9

_Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter._

* * *

Draco finds the silver Bible box, with its elegantly engraved, slithering swirls, in the chapel. It's been stored with quite a collection of other things that past Malfoys have found uncomfortably religious – hymnals, prayer books, a heavy silver sacramental cup engraved with angels, and a little cross on a chain.

He sits down and opens the heavy book, and faint stained-glass rainbows sprinkle the creamy parchment of the pages. The story about Jesus, he remembers vaguely, is at the start of the New Testament, so he flips it open in the middle.

Then he realises that the Old and New Testaments are obviously not the same length, because he's opened the book to the Psalms, which he thinks are in the Old Testament. But the writing looks a bit less intimidating here, set out like short poems on the page.

_Whither shall I go from thy Spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?  
If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.  
If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;  
Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.  
If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me.  
Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee._

It's kind of scary, actually, sort of like it's saying 'You can run as far and fast as you want, but I'll find you anyway.' He reads it again.

_If I make my bed in hell. _It is, he thinks, rather apt, because he _has_ made his bed and now he has to lie in it. All his life he'd wanted the Dark Lord to come back, but now that he _is_ back, it's like a sort of twistedly hellish nightmare.

_Thy right hand shall hold me. _He imagines a gigantic hand, big enough for him to fit in the palm of it, just like Lucille fits in the palm of his own hand. He pictures it scooping him up and carrying him, anywhere, wherever its great Owner chose to go; and he shivers suddenly, imagining being totally helpless, utterly dependant…

…Because he's not helpless now, is he?

…_the darkness hideth not from thee… _Luna in the cellar, shining faintly, moonlike in the darkness…

It's starting to make his head spin, so he flips away from it, riffling through the pages, picking up a phrase here and there. The pages of Psalms are full of pleading, desperate cries for help.

…_I am weak… O Lord, heal me… oh save me…_

_Have mercy upon me, O Lord… I am in trouble…_

_Out of the depths have I cried… O Lord… Lord, hear my voice…_

He rests his chin in his hand, closing his eyes briefly, because he knows, sort of, how that person who wrote it had felt. Terrified – alone – backed against a wall – out of his depth.

He runs his thumb along the edges of the pages, letting the book fall open again randomly somewhere near the middle. A phrase catches his eye.

…_love is strong as death…_

Wasn't that what Luna had said? _Love's not weak. _Her hands had been around his, stroking, calming, and her hair had been falling over her forehead, glimmering palely…

…_love is strong as death…_

_Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it…_

The Canticles, or the Song, it reads at the top of the page. He reads some more, drifting back across the page, and then gulps in shock.

What?!

It's… a love song. As in, a _real_ love song, with… two people telling each other how much they love each other and how beautiful they are…

He hadn't actually known that the Bible had anything quite like this in it.

_My dove, my undefiled…_

_I __am __my beloved's, and my beloved __is __mine…_

_Turn away thine eyes from me, for they have overcome me…_

_Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?_

That bit sounds a lot like Luna. Luna, shining softly like the moon, but like sunshine in a way, too, clear and bright and – brave. And terrible, with a gentle terribleness of her own, because she makes him feel – all the things he doesn't want to feel – excruciatingly alive – less yet more afraid…

He actually sounds like a _Hufflepuff_. He shakes his head to clear it of the unwanted sentimentality, and flips through the pages again, till a flash of colour catches his eye and he opens the book to it.

There's an exquisitely illuminated page, bright with colour, full of little twining illustrations of trees and flowers, animals and birds. Two white-robed angels bearing trumpets flank the words _The New Testament of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ._ Clearly, the dividing page between the two sections.

He looks back at the last page of the Old Testament.

_For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch._

His own family, a part of him says, while at the same time another part screams disloyalty. _All the proud… all that do wickedly…_ The Malfoys have never been ashamed of being proud. Pureblood – the unsullied family line – aristocratic – superior. And he thinks there are probably a whole lot of things they've done that could be classified as 'wicked'.

A tiny shiver runs to the bottom of his spine. The words hold a definite warning: the day is coming. It's coming. He reads it again, slowly, and then on to the next bit.

_But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall._

It's like a loophole, a way out, he thinks, and he imagines great, soft white wings folding round him, around everyone he cares about, safe and strong…

Then he starts to laugh aloud, wildly, because, seriously? There wouldn't be a single thing that would protect him from the Dark Lord's wrath if he started being 'good'. He'd be dead in a snap of the fingers, dead, finished, dead.

He slams the Bible shut, shoves it back into its box with shaking hands, the last traces of hysterical laughter shuddering through him. But all the time, a tranquil little voice that sounds a lot like Luna's is saying, gently, in his head:

_What if you weren't afraid of dying?_

* * *

_The Bible chapters Draco read from (in the order they appear in this chapter):_

_Psalm 139  
Psalm 6  
Psalm 31  
Psalm 130  
Song of Songs 8  
Song of Songs 6  
Malachi 4_


	10. Chapter 10

_Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter._

* * *

'I read the Bible,' he says to Luna, twisting his face in a studied sneer, inspecting the whiteness of his own hands, the long slim fingers.

She hums softly, an invitation for him to continue, and he senses rather than sees her cock her head towards him. Sometimes he wishes his sneering had a bit more effect on her.

'It was rubbish,' he says defiantly, and waits to see what she'll say to that.

She makes a little gurgling noise that sounds like a swallowed giggle. He turns to look at her haughtily, unsmiling. She's actually laughing at him, her mouth going all curly at the edges and imps dancing in her eyes.

He makes a low, irritated sort of growl, deep in his throat, because sometimes she can be awfully annoying. It doesn't help that he wants desperately to kiss her when she smiles like that, either, and he looks away from her with a stern face.

_Don't even think about it._

He jumps when she puts a soft hand on his arm. 'Sorry,' she says. 'What did you read?'

'There was this _love song_,' he mutters. 'Seriously, since when does the Bible have a damn love song in it?'

She's giggling helplessly now. 'You read the Song of Songs, didn't you, Draco?' she asks.

'Yeah…' he says, and the look on his face seems to make her laugh even more. His face is heating, and he finds himself laughing unwillingly along with her.

Finally, when she's finished laughing, she slips her hand in his, leaning against his shoulder contentedly, and they're quiet for a long while.

'Love is – love,' she says eventually, thoughtfully.

'What?'

'There are a lot of different sorts of love. But I think they're really all the same thing.'

'Mm,' he says, and they both go silent again. There's no noise except for their own breaths into the quietness. He can't hear any sound from the broken old wandmaker hidden away in the alcove in the furthest corner.

Draco hardly remembers he's there, mostly – he's easy enough to forget, lying as he does facing the wall in a kind of listless trance, far away at the back of the cellar. He wonders if the old man speaks to Luna, when _he's_ not there. Does she enjoy his company? What do they speak about?

'Mr – Ollivander,' he says awkwardly. 'Is he – OK?' He shifts uncomfortably, because he's not accustomed to actually caring much about the welfare of other people, let alone bothering to ask. But Luna looks up at him with her big grey eyes, and smiles softly as though he's passed a test of some sort. It sends a little shiver through the core of his body.

'He's all right, Draco,' she says, and he watches her lips as she speaks, thinking hazily about the softness of them. 'He just doesn't – speak much…'

'When – when I'm there – you mean?' he says with difficulty, not really registering what he's saying. That fatal little dent in her top lip is making throat close in, and, hardly knowing he's doing it, he slowly raises his index finger and touches it, stroking across the dip…

She licks her lips, an instinctive, nervous reflex, and the tip of her tongue just flicks his finger. The tingling contact makes them both freeze; and the next moment, he tears himself away, striding impetuously over to the wall. Lucille squeaks indignantly and scrabbles out of his pocket and down his leg to the floor. Luna gives an odd little gulp.

'Damn_,_' he grates. '_Damn.' _Frustrated anger washes over him, followed by a wave of something like despair, like defeat_. _He leans on the cellar wall and slowly slides down it to sit on the cold ground.

'I hate everything,' he says miserably. 'It's too_ hard_… oh, Luna, everything. And I can't even _touch _you.' He knows he sounds whiny and pathetic, but Luna is back to her usual serenity, smiling at him tenderly.

'Here,' she says. 'Like this.' And she moves nearer and drops down next to him, and leans back against his chest. His arms go around her and hold her – she's too thin – and she puts her hands over his and relaxes against him.

'It's _hard_,' she says, 'not _too_ hard,' and it's so gentle and encouraging that he feels a burning tightness in his throat, and blinks quickly. Her little cool fingers stroke waves of shivers up his arm, over and over again, then move into patterns of slow circles. He feels his breathing begin to quieten, and tightens his arms around her just a little bit. Lucille, apparently deciding to forgive him for jolting her, scampers back, climbs up, and drapes her tiny body luxuriously over his knee. He can feel the small settling weight of her, and the corner of his mouth twitches.

Luna's growing warmer as he holds her with her back against his chest. Her moon-pale head is nestled into the crook of his neck, his cheek resting in the waves of her hair, and he thinks he would like to stay there for a long, long time. Maybe forever.

But then some irregularity in the wall pokes into his back, and he remembers that he's in the cellar, and it's a _prison_, and she, bright luminous Luna, is a captive in his own house. He scrunches his eyes shut and starts to rock her softly, side to side, and each movement is an atonement.

_Forgive – me. Forgive – me._


	11. Chapter 11

_Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter._

* * *

They bring Potter in the next day, Potter and his friends. Potter, with his face swollen almost unrecognisably, red and inflamed and distorted.

Draco knows it's him anyway. Of course he knows, and he dreads and dreads what he knows is coming.

'They say they've got Potter. Draco, come here.' His mother, her voice completely devoid of expression.

'Well, boy?' Greyback, the werewolf, his voice sending drips of cold sweat down Draco's back.

He hesitates a bit too long, hanging back. He can see, in his mind, Luna's great grey eyes looking at him, solemn, waiting…

'Well, Draco?' His father, avid, showing more interest in him than he has in months. 'Is it? Is it Harry Potter?'

He doesn't look at the other boy, but he can feel the tension in his old enemy. Potter, he knows, is waiting for him to say it, waiting for him to give him away. 'I can't — I can't be sure,' he stalls.

'But look at him carefully, look! Come closer!'

Luna's face, full of light, a beacon-flame…

'Draco, if we are the ones who hand Potter over to the Dark Lord, everything will be forgiven…'

The werewolf interrupts, and Draco tries to calm himself, nervously squeezing his sweat-slick hands into fists at his sides. He thinks of Luna, calls up her face, holds to the thought like a lifeline.

His father's still looking at Potter, his eyes alight with a sort of tense excitement. 'There's something there, it could be the scar, stretched tight… Draco, come here, look properly! What do you think?'

_Luna… No. No. The softest eyes he's ever seen… Oh Luna, Luna!_

He runs his tongue over his lips. 'I don't know,' he says, and turns and walks away.

He's so scared, so scared, because they're going to call the Dark Lord, and he'll _know_, and there's Luna in the cellar and there's nothing, _nothing_ he can do to protect her…_ oh Lord… oh save me, save me!_ Then Bellatrix is shrieking and raving, and she sends the _werewolf_ to take Potter and Weasley to the cellar, and he's so afraid for Luna that his heart almost stops.

And his mad aunt tortures Granger, and the horrible agonised screaming rips right through him like guilt… _all that do wickedly… that do wickedly…_

His father sends him down to fetch the goblin, and before he opens the door, he calls a warning in to the prisoners, more to bolster his own courage than anything.

'Stand back. Line up against the back wall. Don't try anything, or I'll kill you!' It sounds false to his own ears, more frightened than threatening. His voice is shaking, even. Luna will know, though, she'll know, she always knows…

His eyes search her out automatically – she, too, is against the back wall, standing by Ollivander and looking at him gently, almost with a smile. His eyes meet hers for an instant. _Luna – my darling – I love you – forgive me_.

And he takes the goblin and goes, and then – he discovers later – Potter rescues her.

Potter. Always – always – damn – Potter, doing what Draco's too much of a coward to do himself.

* * *

The Dark Lord comes, too furious to even delve into their minds, and turns everything to scarlet pain, smashing them all with the Cruciatus Curse, again and again. Draco's sobbing, whimpering – he is pain – everything is pain – oh God, oh God!

He writhes, the pain piercing, crushing through every part of his body – oh God, he can't take it any more… _Luna! Luna!_ He nearly screams for her – her jasmine-white gentleness – the softness of her hands – _Luna!_ – but he clamps his mouth closed, his limbs jerking, twitching, his head tossed back. There's a pulsing red veil before his eyes – he can't see anything but _him_, the inhuman, merciless face twisted in rage…

When it's over, he's left crumpled, broken, on the floor, too weak to move. He opens his eyes and looks up at the high ceiling, the image of her face swimming before his eyes like a bright candle-flame.

'Luna…' he whispers.

* * *

She's gone, and everything's grey, dreary, lifeless, and he despises his weakness in wishing she was still there. There's a distant, dull relief that she's safe, though. He wonders, pitifully, if she thinks about him at all – what she told Potter and his friends…

She said she loved him, once, and he clings to it fiercely.

_I love you too, you know…_

…_love is strong as death…_

_Love is – love._

And he drops his face silently into his hands, and the shameful tears leak out.

What's going to happen? Surely, _surely_ Potter doesn't stand a chance – an idiotic teenage Gryffindor against the Dark Lord in full power?

But the Dark Lord is angry, and growing angrier, more dangerous, as the incongruously soft spring days pass by, almost as though he's – afraid – of something Potter might do.

Draco doesn't know which side is going to win, and he doesn't know what would be worse. If the Dark Lord finally defeats Harry Potter, Luna will still be in danger… they'll imprison her again, if they find her. And if – somehow – he hardly dares to let the thought form – against all odds, Potter manages to defeat the Dark Lord…

Well, he, Draco, would probably be in Azkaban then, and there's no way Luna would – would – have anything to do with him. He grinds his knuckles into the tired grittiness of his eyes, trying not to pay mind to the spreading, terrified void inside him. Azkaban – the Dementors – dark and empty and alone, alone with his hideous memories…

But she said she loved him – she _said_ it – and he snatches desperately at the thought of her, holding it up like a shield, a patronus of light to hold back the darkness.

* * *

He goes back to the chapel one time more, slinking off there in the early morning with the rising of the sun. His mother has not gone there since Potter came.

Lucille, curled up within his fingers, watches as he bends over the heavy Bible again. With his free hand, he opens the creamy pages near the right hand end, the New Testament. He sheafs through the pages, looking for what Luna spoke about…

His fingers are shaking a little bit, so that he nearly tears a page, and that's when he spots the word, sprinkled thickly through a cluster of sentences.

…_for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.  
He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love._

He reads it, staring at the two little sentences for a long time before slowly closing the book. Lucille squeaks softly and curls her tiny paws around his finger.

* * *

_The scripture Draco reads is in 1 John 4._


	12. Chapter 12

_Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter._

* * *

He goes back to school, though it feels like one of the most ridiculous things he's ever done. He goes, and waits – waits, in the way that one waits for their doom to fall and the world to turn to ash.

* * *

And then it happens. Potter's back, playing the hero as he always has, and the Dark Lord is coming, sending his chilling ultimatum before him. Draco, summoned to the Great Hall with the other students, sits apart from the others at the Slytherin table, his head bowed. At least, he thinks, Luna is safe, far away in some hidden shelter, no doubt. He stares at his hands, noticing, in exquisite detail, the little lines over each joint of his fingers, the blue network of veins beneath the surface of the skin…

Potter… Potter, who refused his offer of friendship when they first started at Hogwarts. Who was better than him, always, at Quidditch. Potter, who fought Draco's father at the Department of Mysteries and had him sent to Azkaban, while Draco was left to comfort his distraught mother as best he could. Potter, Dumbledore's favourite student – Dumbledore, who Draco couldn't quite manage to kill.

Potter, who'd done what Draco was too much of a coward to do himself, rescued Luna...

Then Pansy Parkinson shrieks that Potter's _there_, screaming for someone to grab him. Draco raises his head for the first time, watching dully as the other three houses rise to protect the Boy Who Lived, their wands out.

And then he sees, with the Ravenclaws, the shockingly familiar glimmer of moon-gold hair. His heart jolts in his throat.

_Luna!_

She, too, is standing, protecting Potter, who rescued her from her prison, and it's _him_, Potter, that she's looking towards. Potter. And cold, cold hatred rises up and takes him in the throat, and he forgets everything, everything except that he wants to strangle Potter. A gaping emptiness is spreading inside him, but as fast as it spreads, the hatred fills it up.

He slides away when the students are dismissed, taking Crabbe and Goyle with him. They're happy enough to come with him when he says that they're going after Potter, and he's almost sure he knows where to look.

* * *

They confront Potter, and all the while icy hatred drips through him, hatred that's been seven years in the building. He's not sure what he's going to do, now that Potter's finally at his mercy, but the frozen coldness inside him drives him on. He demands his wand back in a voice that's as brittle as icicles.

But then it all spins beyond his control, and Crabbe won't listen to him anymore, and he finds that despite the raging within him, he can't simply stand by and let Potter be killed, any more than he could kill Dumbledore.

_Coward. Coward. Coward._

And then Crabbe's killed, killed by his own Fiendfyre, and Potter saves him and Goyle, and he could scream with the weakness of rage, if he hadn't been so tired – so tired that even his hatred seems to be melting through his fingers… He slumps on the floor.

It occurs to him, somewhere folded between layers of exhaustion, that Luna would perhaps not think he had been behaving very well. But then he remembers that she has Potter now, Potter who's brave and _good_ and does the right thing without even thinking about it.

He dashes his hand very quickly across his eyes.

* * *

It all blurs together, fire and curse-flashes and the silver-masked faces of Death Eaters, shrieking and swearing and cries of triumph and despair. All he wants is to survive, and he's looking everywhere, frantically, for the glimmer of long, moon-pale hair, fear filling him up like dark icy water.

And then it looks like it's all over, Potter's lying, still, on the ground, the Dark Lord laughing above him. But Potter rises up and fights again, and finally – finally – faces the Dark Lord, and defeats him.

Draco's numb, and sick with confused fear beneath the numbness. His parents find him and they cling to each other, pride and coldness washed away, huddling by the wall while others weep and celebrate around them.

Lucille has been sheltering in his pocket during the fighting. He puts his hand out for her and she climbs into it, and it feels, oddly, like everything's a dream except for the tiny weight of the little mouse in his palm, and his heart beating chokingly high in his throat.

Then his father reaches out and takes his mother's begrimed face between shaking hands.

'Narcissa…' Lucius says, and his voice is hoarse, scratchy. 'My dearest… I'm sorry. Forgive me. This is all my fault.'

'Oh, Lucius…' she whispers, and Draco sees that she's weeping as she puts her hands over his fathers' and looks up into his bruised face.

And Draco, looking away, sees Luna, standing not ten feet away from him, her moon-whiteness streaked with dirt and blood. She's watching him gently, waiting.

* * *

'Luna,' he says.

She smiles a little, and moves towards him. 'Draco.'

He just looks at her. A lot of things that were confused before are going crystal clear in his mind, and two important points rise to the surface: he loves her, and, _because_ he loves her, he mustn't have anything to do with her, not now, not ever.

So he stiffens his face and his back and says, in a low voice, 'Go away, now, Luna.'

She's looking at him with her head tilted a little to one side, and, infuriatingly, actually looking _amused_. Sudden frustration bubbles up inside him.

'_Damn_ you…' he grates. 'Damn it all!' Lucille squeaks disapprovingly and climbs down him to the floor. He hardly notices, glaring smoulderingly at the space over Luna's shoulder.

'Draco,' she says, and her voice is gentle. 'You're damning things, so I know you're upset.'

'Upset?' he snarls. 'Upset? Why would I be upset? Me and my parents are only going to Azkaban!' He takes a long, calming breath and goes on in a level voice, not looking at her. 'Just – go, Luna. Go back to – Potter, he'll – take care of you and – make you – happy.'

She makes an odd little soft sound and reaches out her hand to touch his wrist, and the feel of her light fingers sends a shiver through him. But he keeps his eyes on a point a few feet away on the floor.

'Won't you look at me, Draco?' Her voice is just a murmur, sending him warm and cool and making something flip inside his stomach, and it goads him into action.

'Fine!' he says, wrenching his head up and looking at her fiercely. 'Fine! Happy…?'

Her eyes are soft, so soft, and there's a tender little smile on her lips as she looks up at him. 'You're alive,' she says simply. 'I'm very happy, because I love you. You.'

'No!' he says sternly. 'No.'

'You can't stop me from loving you,' she points out, dreamily. 'And if you were put in prison, I don't think you could stop me coming to see you, either. But, you know, I don't think they will send you to Azkaban, not after I tell them what you did for me when I was a prisoner, anyway.' And she reaches out and slips both her hands into his, clasping his fingers, waiting.

'Luna,' he says, low and wretched, and then stops, not sure how to continue. How does he explain this to her, explain why he _needs_ to do this, even if it rips his heart bleeding from his chest? 'Luna… I can't – let you. I'm a – coward. A Death Eater. I was too weak to – save you.'

'And yet – you're strong enough, brave enough, to do – this,' she says, very softly, and her words drop into the bubble of silence that seems to have formed around the two of them. And he looks into her eyes, and knows that somehow, insanely, despite _everything_, she loves him – she actually _loves_ him.

…_love is strong as death…_

_Love is – everything._

She squeezes his hands again, her fingers clinging and steady and firm, conveying unspoken messages through the contact of skin on skin. _I love you. I won't leave you. I belong with you._

He looks down at her, a long, questioning look, and it feels like his whole being, and Luna's, are kaleidoscopic puzzles, made up of myriads of multi-coloured mosaic pieces, shifting and mingling and dancing to form a final figure, a single whole, heartwrenchingly complete.

And he puts his arms around her tightly and buries his face in her hair, and his face is wet and he's shuddering against her. But she doesn't seem to mind, because she's bracing him with her slight body, her cheek against his heart and her hands as warm as sunshine on his back.

* * *

_The epilogue will be coming soon…_


	13. Epilogue

_Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to Harry Potter._

* * *

Light spins around them, cocooning them softly. Draco glances up at the stained-glass dove, then back down into Luna's face. Her gown is white, but around her neck are three strings of sparkling, multi-coloured glass beads, the sort of thing, he thinks, that no other bride would have dreamt of wearing before, or ever again. Certainly a strange, pained look had come across his mother's face when she saw the necklace that her son's bride was wearing.

But he rather likes the way the beads lie on Luna's white throat and collarbones, and the way that there are little rainbows glancing off the fairness of her hair…

She's smiling up at him with those big, grey, soft eyes, full of light. _I love you so much._

He's dimly aware of his parents watching in the background, his mother with a lace handkerchief at her eyes, his father stiff, aristocratic. And Luna's father, clad entirely in squintingly vibrant yellow, whose enthusiastic eccentricity couldn't have formed a stranger contrast to Lucius Malfoy's cool composure. But both men care for their children, in their own ways, and both are lending their support…

Lucille's there too, perched on the narrow ledge beneath the stained-glass window, looking down on them with the air of a proud parent, her head tipped on one side and her paws clasped in front of her chest.

The wizard who is marrying them is reading from the Bible, his voice slow, echoing slightly into the peaceful still spaces of the chapel.

'Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.'

_I love you. You._

…_strong… as death… God is love…_

_Love is… everything._

_Everything._

_Everything. _It's as though the whole world is contained in her soft eyes.

The marriage-wizard raises his wand, and together they look towards it. Threads of light spring from the tip and twirl around both their wrists, their clasped hands, weaving and entwining. Two silvery rings glimmer on their hands like bands of moonlight, reflecting the colours of their faces.

Then he turns his head back to meet her eyes again, and smiles at her, a little uncertainly – _we've actually done this?_ And she reaches up and touches his cheek softly.

* * *

She comes to him, smiling a little from her grey eyes, her hair loose and falling over her soft bare shoulders, and her hands held out to him.

'Draco,' she says softly.

For a moment he's still, looking at her deeply, and it's as though the moment is carved out of bright precious stone. But then it liquefies and melts into something softer, more tender, and he reaches his hand out and runs hesitant, gentle, reverent fingers down the curve of her cheek.

'Luna,' he says, and he wants to say so much more, tell her how achingly _much_ he loves her, but the words aren't there.

And perhaps it's not the time for words after all, because in the next moment they're in each other's arms, clinging, melting, joy flooding through them like soft many-hued light.

* * *

_1 John 4 v 7-11_

* * *

_So, there is the epilogue! Won't they have adorable little blonde babies? ;)_

_I've also posted the first part of a two-shot about Draco and Luna after they're married. It's called Darkness Before Dawn. Please have a look!_

_Now: to all the lovely, kind people who have favourited, followed or reviewed this story so far – thank you so much. You have made me so happy!_

_Every single review, even if it's just a few words, gives me a warm happy thrill. If you don't review, I won't have a nervous breakdown. I will survive. BUT… if you do review, know that you are making the author very, very happy. Seriously, even if you come along when this story is years old, I'll still get that warm thrill to think that someone else cares enough about my writing to let me know. Thank you!_


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